Andre Isoir - The Golden Age of French Organ (1972-76) [2013 6CD Box Set]

Recorded between 1972 and 1976 and winner of the most prestigious awards, Le Livre d’or de l’orgue français (Golden Age of French Organ Music) is one of the most comprehensive anthologies ever dedicated to this instrument.

Leaving aside the six Messiaen albums entrusted to Louis Thiry, André Isoir recorded the remaining twenty-four LPs in a trajectory leading from the Renaissance to the twentieth century. Nearly twenty of these titles survey the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and it is these that are now reissued here. André Isoir evokes here his memories of this extraordinary undertaking.

While a certain universality guided the language of organ music in Europe until the late sixteenth century, nurtured on polyphony and transcriptions of vocal repertory, on free preludes or fantasias, the French school began to go its own way in the course of the following decades. It developed in the service of the Roman Catholic Church, in a context where plainchant retained great resonance, while the dominance of colour and a kind of intoxication with timbre resulted from techniques of instrument building that anticipated the tendencies of the repertory itself. From Titelouze to Dandrieu, the programmes presented here bear witness to the constancy of these factors throughout one of the most prosperous periods for French organ music, which coincides almost exactly with the reigns of Louis XIII and Louis XIV.

Tracks:

CD 1
François Couperin (1668-1733)
Messe à l'usage des paroisses

Gilles Jullien (1650-1703)
Préludes a cinq parties avec pédale de trompette en taille
Chromhorne en Taille
Dialogue

Jean-Henry d'Anglebert
Quatuor sur le Kyrie a trois sujets du plain-chant

Louis Couperin (c.1626 – 1661)
Chaconne en ré mineur
Branle de Basque
Fantaisie
Passacaille (39 Variations)

CD 2
François Couperin (1668-1733)
Messe pour les couvents de religieux

Jehan Titelouze (c.1562/63 – 1633)
Veni Creator
Pange Lingua
Ave Maris Stella
Exultet Coelum

CD 3
Nicolas de Grigny (1672-1703)
La messe

Nicolas Lebegue (1631-1702)
Élévation en sol
Symphonie sur le fa bémol

CD 4
Nicolas de Grigny (1672-1703)
Les hymnes

CD 5
Jean-Adam Guilain (1680-1739)
Suite du premier ton
Suite du quatrième ton
Suite du deuxième ton
Suite du troisième ton

Louis Marchand (1669-1732)
Plein jeu
Fugue
Basse de Trompette
Quatuor
Fond d'orgue
Grand Dialogue

CD 6
Louis-Nicolas Clérambault (1676-1749)
Suite du premier ton
Suite du deuxieme ton

Gaspard Corrette (c. 1671 – before 1733)
Dialogue de Voix Humaine
Dessus de Tierce par accords
Dialogue a deux choeurs

Pierre du Mage (1674-1751)
Premier livre d'orgue

Jean-François Dandrieu (c.1682–1738)
Plein jeu du premier ton
Fugue sur I'Ave Maris Stella
Basse et dessus de trompette
Muzete
Offertoire
Duo en cor de chasse

Personnel:

André Isoir (organ)